1. Field of the Invention
This invention is concerned with apparatus for rapidly and continuously cutting notches in stringer numbers used in the construction of material supporting pallets.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is known that material capable of being palletized is conveniently picked up and moved about by fork-lift trucks. To do this the pallets must be provided with a way to allow the forks of a fork-lift truck to get under the loaded pallet so it can be lifted. Loaded pallets have considerable load carrying ability, so that manual movement is not possible because of the weight factor.
A typical pallet is constructed with a deck formed of spaced-apart boards that are interconnected by spaced stringers, and the stringers are stabilized by bottom boards. The forks of a fork lift truck are spaced apart so they can be inserted into a pallet for purposes of lifting the pallet. The pallets need to be constructed so the lift truck forks can get under the loaded deck and gain a secure engagement before lifting the pallet. It is known that pallet stringers need to be formed with notches of a size to accommodate the forks of the lift truck. The notches need to be properly sized and spaced so that they will be rendered generally universal in accommodating different fork lift trucks. The forming of notches is usually carried out by cutting across the grain of the stringer wood, and there must be an adequate surface in the notches to keep the pallet substantially level and flat on the forks so the load is securely stable when being moved about.
The problems encountered in machine notching stringer members is that tools to form the notches tend to split the wood because the tools must cut across the wood grain. Wood that splits must be discarded which adds to the cost of usable members. Notching tools are slow and expensive which adds to the cost of producing usable notched stringers.